MD Home Care Providers Vote for AFSCME

February 14, 2008

PROVIDERS TOGETHER – Maryland home care providers voted overwhelmingly in February to organize a union with AFSCME.

Photo Credit: Joe Lawrence

More than 4,000 home care providers throughout the state voted overwhelmingly this month to make AFSCME their union.

The providers work in the homes of some 20,000 seniors – and others with disabilities – who otherwise might be consigned to nursing homes or state facilities. Audra Feldman, a Baltimore provider who has been working for years to build a union with AFSCME, says …

“There’s a real excitement among us providers. We feel like we’re on the move. We fought for this, it’s ours, and it’s an opening to a better future.”

The Maryland providers join 80,000 other home care providers in public and private facilities nationwide who have chosen AFSCME. Most of them are represented by United Domestic Workers of America (UDW)-NUHHCE, an AFSCME affiliate in California.

The providers’ achievement – four years in the making – follows an Executive Order signed last August by Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) that gave them the power join a union and bargain collectively with the state over their Medicaid-funded program. Key issues include reimbursement rates, payment schedules and benefits.

Now, with the leverage that comes from unity, they are ready to stand up and demand the basic respect that any worker is entitled to. Learn more about AFSCME’s home care providers at AFSCME.org.